Mafia kingpin's lair betrayed by pair of socks

Camorra Mafia supremo Michele Zagaria is in an Italian prison thanks to an
investigator's lucky break.

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Michele Zagaria, pictured after his arrest on this weekPhoto: REUTERS

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Michele Zagaria occupied a room built beneath a five-metre deep layer of concrete to stop sound and heat being detected from above. His lair, under a villa in Casapesenna, near Naples, had a bed, settee, soft lighting
and airconditioningPhoto: ANSA

Languishing in a top-security Italian prison this weekend after 16 years on the run, mob supremo Michele Zagaria has no shortage of time to ponder the reasons for his downfall.

Already convicted in absentia of murder and extortion, the head of the feared Camorra Mafia was arrested last week in his secret underground compound, and now has the rest of his life in prison to work out what led to his capture. Was it a rare informant on his home turf of Casapesenna, just outside Naples, where many townsfolk regard him as a "saint"?

Surely not. Might Vicenzo Inquieto, the scruffy associate whose house he lived beneath, have betrayed him? Unlikely. Or could it even be due to the recent downfall of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, in whose government he allegedly had "protectors"?

None of the above, smiles Pietro Morelli, the dapper deputy chief of the Naples Flying Squad that finally nailed him on Wednesday. Instead, his explanation is one that may lead to a bizarre new amendment to Mob codes of conduct: if you want to stay one step of ahead of the law, it seems, do not do so while wearing expensive Italian socks.

"It was a hard manhunt because we had no idea what his voice was like, as he never communicated by phone, or really what he looked like any more," said Mr Morelli, who has combed the length of Italylooking for Mr Zagaria, helped only by an ageing mugshot in his wallet.

"But when we finally did surveillance on the house where we thought he was, we checked the rubbish bins and found a very expensive pair of Gallo socks that had been thrown out. I wear Gallo socks myself, but we knew the owner of the house didn't dress that smartly, so there had to be someone else living there. Someone with plenty money."

The arrest of Mr Zagaria, 53, whose Casalesi clan was the most powerful of all the Camorristi, could not come at a better time for many Italians, for whom the Mob's enduring power is a symptom of the same malaise in public life that has also brought the Eurozone crisis and the demise of Mr Berlusconi, who faces court himself over the "bunga bunga" affair. Interior minister Annamaria Cancellieri hailed it as a "huge success for the state" – not words any Italian politician has had much cause to use recently – while Mario Monti, the newly-installed "technocrat" prime minister, described it as a "beautiful day for all honest people".

By that logic, though, there are not many honest people in Casapesenna, where last week, Mr Zagaria's arrest was treated like a bereavement.

"Michele was a galant'uomo (a man of honour)," said one middle aged man, to general nods of approval along the bar in the town's Garcon café, where groups of men loiter to drink, play cards, and, it is said, keep watch for strangers. "He moved the economy and provided work for people."

That Mr Zagaria certainly did, and despite the Camorra's reputation for extraordinary ruthlessness – it has been linked to more than 3,000 murders in the past three decades – career options in his service were not limited to jobs as hitmen. For rather than sticking to "traditional" Mob activities like drug-dealing and illegal waste dumping, Mr Zagaria diversified the Camorra into a much wider business conglomerate, producing everything Italians hold dear, from mozzarella cheese to sugar sachets for espressos.

In particular, he focused on the construction business, in which he was known as “the king of tendering”; firms linked to the Casalesi clan, it is said, built half the shopping malls in the Naples region, as well as the high-speed train link from Rome to southern Italy, and even a new prison and Nato radar base.

The Casalesi empire did not build its 30 billion euro empire without resorting violence when necessary, though. Rival building contracts would often have their projects burned down, and in 2010, Mr Zagaria, whose nickname was “capastorta”, or twisted head, because of his lopsided features, was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment after a 12-year trial against 36 members clan members for murder and other crimes. Police believe he personally carried out at least three shootings while moving up the ranks as a young clan lieutenant in the 1980s.

His gang’s diversification into skilled construction work was apparent from the sophistication of his subterranean hideout at No 9, Mascagni, one of numerous gaudy, palace-like villas in Casapesenna which squat behind vast prison-like gates.

Police found a special rollback floor, where a shaft of steps led down to a room built beneath a five-metre deep layer of concrete, designed to prevent noise or heat being detected from above. But unlike Saddam Hussein's spartan spider hole, it came with quality Italian interior design – a parquet wooden floorboard and soft lighting, as well as a bed, settee, and flat screen television. Also on the wall were a screens linked to CCTV cameras outside – one of them hidden in a statue of the Virgin Mary that at the front of the house. "The place was like a four-star hotel, total luxury," one detective said. "It even had a system for detecting police bugs."

These were not the only obstacles that Mr Morelli's squad had to overcome.

Establishing that he might be in the house was an exhaustive process over many months following his associates and residents of Casapesenna, in which one of the suspicious signs was the amount of electricity the hideout used to keep the bunker properly air-conditioned. But with the villa tucked at the end of a long, narrow alleyway guarded by "sentinelle", or look outs, close surveillance was impossible – hence the dustbin trawl.

Given that most of Naples' Flying Squad dress like they might be undercover at a fashion shoot, with narrow-cut jackets, swept-back hair and designer scarves, the discovery of a pair of posh €30 socks was perhaps a more obvious clue than it might have been for their less-style conscious British counterparts. But what clinched it further were empty packets of Merit cigarettes, known as their target's favoured brand.

A final clue came last Tuesday, when police did a series of dawn raids in the neighbouring town of Casal di Principe, word of which soon reached No 9 Mascagni and brought Mr Inquieto – whose name, aptly enough, means "He who worries" – wandering around anxiously outside his house. "It was 5.15am – if he had nothing to hide, why was he up at that time?" Mr Morelli, 47, told The Sunday Telegraph. "That was checkmate."

A 150-strong police force raided the villa the following day, sealing off the entire town beforehand. Yet the man paraded before the television cameras in handcuffs looked more like a deputy headmaster than a mob boss, with cropped, greying hair, silver-rimmed spectacles, and a calm, emotionless expression. He might even have been the Mafia's version of a technocrat like Mr Monti – an impression bolstered by the contents of his library, which included a book on the late Apple boss Steve Jobs, and a copy of "Gomorrah", the bestselling 2006 expose of the Camorra's activities, in which the Casalesi clan features prominently (its author, Roberto Saviano, has been under armed police protection ever since).

"Zagaria was a well-educated man, the sort of criminal who wouldn't punch someone but would have a discussion first," Mr Morelli added. "But he represented the real 'anti-state' in Casapesenna. He provided jobs for people, and so they become completely sucked up by this kind of system, they don't even realise they are enslaved."

That, though, may only change when the Italian government finally gets its act together, according to Father Luigi Menditto, 75, the local priest. In an interview with this newspaper, he angrily denied earlier reports that he had allowed Mr Zagaria into his church, but he did describe him as "a man of God".

"He brought good things to the people outside my church door," he said.

"The state has been absent from this town in terms of providing jobs and services, and that is a problem that the political class should address.

Casapesenna's reputation is so bad that when people leave, they sometimes remove it from their birth certificates so that people will not be put off employing them."

Right now, a more immediate concern among Casapesenna's residents is the prospect of a bloody turf-battle as younger, and possibly more volatile, Camorristi vie to take over Mr Zagaria's role.

"I am neutral, but it was a big mistake to arrest him," said the elderly caretaker of the "Garden of Law", a palm-tree lined local leisure park opened by Italy's interior ministry as a pointed affront to the Casalesi clan's activities. "When the Pope is dead, you have no idea who will be the next Pope."

Nor, indeed, is the outgoing "Pope" necessarily done yet. For as he left his home last week, Mr Zagaria, who asked for a change of clothes beforehand, made a final fashion statement: a purple jumper, which, in Naples, is known as a colour of sadness.

For Camorristi, the clothes that bosses wear when arrested are said to convey secret signals – possibly that he intends to continue ruling from his jail cell. Whatever the message, though, Mr Morelli's knows his work is far from over.

"This was a big result because we got the king, but the fight against the Camorra goes on."